Chronicles of Den'dra: A land on Fire

by Spencer Johnson

  “It really was quite tragic. The brewer and his son were killed in a house fire. Found both their skeleton’s in the ashes. Simply tragic. Reigns’ men showed up a week or so later and poked around for some reason. Never could figure out why. Have you been to Yrany anytime in the past? I know that I have seen you someplace before.” Urake weighed the options before him with a smile. On the one hand he could retain his anonymity or he could capitalize on a possible friendship. Friends were few and far in between in these troubled times.

  “I have been to Yrany. I was a goldsmith with my son. Perhaps… perhaps you might recall him better than I. Skeln?” The die was cast. Urake had no reason to conceal that portion of his past if he expected this new fraction to assist in his search.

  “No, no, it’s not possible. He died in the fire! We found the skeletons.” Redzyn was taken aback by Urake’s comment and protested while peering at Urake with his bushy eyebrows contracted in a frown.

  “There were another two of Reigns’ men buried out back in the trees. They came after Skeln so I eliminated them.” Redzyn simply stared for a few seconds before he snapped his mouth shut.

  “I take it that you aren’t a brewer or a goldsmith. Who are you then and why are you accompanying the Princess?”

  “No, not a brewer or a goldsmith, although I had talent at both trades. My past is a little more colorful. I'm the Asgare. I'm protecting the Princess, or more accurately, the Queen. Illiad is dead.” Redzyn handled the revelation far better than Urake had anticipated.

  “The Asgare. Living under my nose for nigh onto fifteen years. Incredible… What happened to Skeln?”

  “That is part of the reason that I'm here. He somehow knew that the men were after him and escaped. I went after him as soon as I had disposed of Reigns’ men, but I lost the trail in Warton. Been trying to find him ever since.”

  “That’s a shame. If things had turned out differently, I had been planning on offering him a job in my fields.” Urake finally freed the strap and lifted the saddle off the tired horse. Aleest appeared and led the horse to what stood for the stables, leaving Urake with the saddle and his pack.

  “He mentioned thinking about asking your foreman. By the way, how did you managed to get here?” Urake swung the saddle over his shoulder and hefted the pack with his free hand. Redzyn began moving towards the mouth of a cave so Urake followed.

  “I used to be an officer under Balinor during the Clan Wars so he sent me a message asking to meet me. I suspected that something was up and was making plans to meet him when a man arrived at my door with a scroll authorizing him to take possession of my lands in the name of the King. A landmaster, if you will. He had one for Rothac also. The sniveling bastard had the nerve to try and disguise the obvious and told us that the crown was concerned for our lands, considering that we were heirless and all. No thanks to Reigns. He also explained that only a trueborn heir could be considered legitimate so on our deaths the land would go to the crown. Until then, he was just there to assist us in our old age.”

  “Sounds like something Reigns would do.” It turned out that the cave was an elaborate network that extended into the hillside for some distance.

  “Precisely what I thought. I politely thanked the son of a rat for his kind offer of assistance. On the other hand, Rothac screamed bloody murder and called it for what it was. He suffered an accident the next day and broke his neck on the way to the garderobe. A couple days later I informed the new landmaster that with him to keep an eye on my lands, I could finally go visit an old friend in Cercha. Naturally I feared bandits and brought my household servants and guards with me. They in turn secreted everything of value that I owned in their baggage. The next thing I know, Balinor puts me in charge of this place.” Redzyn finished his tale with a laugh and stepped into a side cave with a table and a bed. “I hope this is satisfactory. I am afraid our accommodations are rather spartan.”

  “I’ve been in far worse. If I could get an extra bed in here for my assistant, it would be perfect.”

  “Of course. It would save us a bunk in general quarters. We don’t have many private rooms, but I think the Asgare deserves one.”

  “I appreciate it. It is nice to have some privacy. Emeck gets uncomfortable around too many people.”

  “Training a new assassin?” Redzyn asked with a raised eyebrow and a smile that betrayed a joke.

  “He has… other talents that assist me in my work.”

  “Prodigy tracker or something?” Redzyn shrugged and crossed his arms.

  “You could say that.”

  “By the way, do you still have that sword? Cold Heart or something.”

  “Ice Heart. Kept it under my bed all those years.” Urake pulled back his cloak and drew the sword. Seeing that Redzyn suddenly looked a little nervous, he handed it to the colonel for a closer look. Redzyn accepted and began examining the blade carefully, murmuring all the time about the exquisite workmanship.

  “They say that you held this blade to the King’s throat once.” Redzyn glanced up and scrutinized Urake.

  “At least you haven’t accused me of trying to kill the King. I was misled as to his identity and removed the sword from Illiad’s throat as soon as I recognized him.” Urake crossed his arms and leaned against the wall opposite Redzyn.

  “I suppose that in your line of work, no one tells you they want you to kill the King.” Redzyn handed the blade back to Urake carefully.

  “The instant that I recognized the King, I knew that Reigns was behind it. That hafling already had more than enough power; besides, he wasn’t just after the King.”

  “Very true. We should have put out a contract on Reigns. Enough money and if you had killed him all those years ago, we wouldn’t be hiding from him now.”

  “That isn’t how I worked. I did the occasional paying contract, but only so I could afford to maintain my other activities. Even then, I never killed for the money.” Redzyn looked confused.

  “Why did you do it then? For fun?”

  “Most of the people that Reigns hired me to kill, I relocated and gave them a new life. I only killed the ones that were dangerous to the people.” Urake tried to explain.

  “If this is true… then you must know a lot of people that hold a grudge against Reigns.”

  “I do. Most of them work for me now.”

  “Could you get any of them to come and swell our ranks? Only a few of the noble houses have given us their support so our numbers are a little slimmer than we had hoped.”

  “House Inarack has assisted me in a limited manner. If they gave as much effort to your cause then they should have sent maybe twenty men?” Redzyn laughed before responding.

  “I won’t ask how you know about their involvement. They have been our largest supporter. Most of our men are from their vassals, I for one. Mostly just low ranking men. They can’t send any more support without betraying themselves. But back to the original question, could you get any of your contacts to join us?”

  “They trust me. They don’t trust much dealing with the government. For now, they would be better placed where they are. It isn’t like they would be doing much here besides taking up space and consuming supplies.” Urake saw Redzyn flinch and open his mouth to argue before thinking better of it and saying something else.

  “You are probably right. I'm not at liberty to divulge more of the plan.”

  “What is your opinion of Gifted people?” Urake abruptly changed the topic.

  “All you ever hear about is one of them committing some atrocity. They seem inclined to harm others.” Redzyn parroted some of the prevalent propaganda that Reigns circulated in the hopes that he could convince people to turn in anyone suspected of being Gifted.

  “You claim to hate Reigns yet you speak his words. Hypothetically, if the Princess was Gifted, what would your opinion be?” Urake pressed Redzyn on the point.

  “Humph. Impossible although; hypothetically speaking, if she were, then I would be inclined to embrace anyone Gi
fted. As it is, I agree that they can’t all be evil. We could actually use the help. I hear that they can perform some incredible feats.”

  “Indeed. Quite incredible. I witnessed several of them and have myself worked with a few over the years. How are things going here? Is there anything that I can do to help?” Urake had extracted what he needed to know from Redzyn and felt it safer to keep secret the identities of those he knew to be Gifted for the time being. Revealing what he knew would be more uncomfortable than dangerous.

  “Oh, I suppose as well as they can be. I'm sure that there are a few things that you could do, but aren’t you exhausted?”

  “For some reason, I'm not. I couldn’t sleep if I wanted to. Emeck is sure to be tired though, so he can have the bed for now.” Urake thought back and realized that he hadn’t felt tired since he and Emeck had saved Em’risi. Muscles had been sore and stiff after days of walking, but he had not been exhausted. Over the last few days on the journey with the Princess, he had been volunteering to take night watches and had been subsiding on only a couple hours of sleep a day without having felt the inevitable drain.

  “Then we should find him. He was the young man that arrived with you?” Redzyn moved out the chamber entrance and Urake followed ducking the lower sections of the connecting passage.

  “There were two of them. Emeck was the one with the dark hair. Aleest is the one with the dirty blond hair.”

  “Ah, I will have him informed of your chamber’s location. If you really aren’t tired, then I can see about something to do. Have you any medical experience? The healers here are just medics. Their expertise involves setting broken bones and sewing up cuts.”

  “I have a fair knowledge of medicine. Not as much as your average healer yet adequate to survive in my line of work.”

  “Splendid. House Inarack promised to send us a healer as soon as they could, but until then, I have a puzzle for you. There was a couple young individuals that stumbled across our camp some time ago. They nearly were able to subdue the sentries that apprehended them so we brought them in and interrogated them. They claim to be simple travelers, a blacksmith and his sister, but they were able to overpower two of my men before they were outnumbered. They have been held prisoners until Balinor is able to make a decision concerning them.”

  “I fail to see how that requires a healer unless they were injured in their capture or an escape attempt.” Urake turned the conversation back into its original stream.

  “Oh, I seem to have begun rambling. The thing is, several days ago the girl collapsed and we haven’t been able to wake her.” Redzyn pointed to a wooden door fashioned into the mouth of another chamber similar to Urake’s own. Emeck was peering through the bars that were nailed over the window.

  “What is it Emeck?” Urake could see a young man at the side of the bed where the young woman lay to all appearances deep in sleep.

  “It is really strange. I'm sure that I sensed her when I sensed Skeln. I think that she is the echo. The strangest thing is what I can see through her eyes. It’s like she is in her imagination and seeing things that aren’t here. I can see some blurry bars, like in a jail cell, and two or three people. One of them is about a normal height and the other two are really short. The one is wearing shiny armor and I can see a reflection. It is hard to make out but…” Emeck stiffened as if he had seen a ghost. Before Urake could formulate a response Redzyn interrupted the silent conversation.

  “So what do you think? You can go in there. The blacksmith is worried sick and won’t bother you.” Redzyn had the door unlocked and Urake stepped inside. Emeck followed and the door was locked again on the outside. The young man jumped up and approached as soon as he realized that he wasn’t alone with the girl.

  “Please can you help her? I'm her brother, Gastin. Please do something.”

  “His name isn’t Gastin. It’s Torroth, but that isn’t important. The reflection I saw isn’t hers, its Skeln’s. She is somehow seeing through Skeln’s eyes.” Urake glanced at Emeck in surprise.

  “Impossible!” Urake was sure that Emeck had made a mistake somehow.

  “You can’t do anything either?” Torroth hadn’t been privy to Emeck’s shocking statement and had thought Urake’s audible response to be in relation to Inadar’s condition.

  “Torroth, who is she?” Urake’s blunt question drained what little color there was from Torroth’s face.

  “I… How…? I'm her… She is my sister.” Torroth’s composure was shattered and the beginnings of fear were growing in his eyes.

  “I doubt that she is your sister any more than you are a simple blacksmith. What is she? Do you know Skeln? A boy about yea tall with blue eyes and blond hair? He might be calling himself Cero. He could be taller by now. It has been a little while since I have seen him.” Urake held his hand about the height of his shoulder.

  “I don’t know any Skeln or Cero. I don’t care what you do with me, but can you help her?”

  “Why should I do anything to you?” Urake detected that there was still something that Torroth was hiding. It didn’t take a telepath to figure that much out.

  “Because I'm the only one that survived out of Verkal’s unit after the dragon attack. Torture or kill me for deserting, but she is innocent.” Urake laughed causing Torroth to shrink back.

  “I should have killed Verkal myself years ago. That fool was a cold hearted imbecile; although, he did have a knack for finding Gifted people and killing them. It’s only fitting that a dragon killed him. The fact that you deserted is more of a recommendation in my book. However, that still doesn’t answer my question as to who and what she is.”

  “You are apparently Gifted so why don’t you tell me.” Urake eyed the young man. He looked ready to wage war on anyone who might harm the girl, despite the fact he was defenseless. He did have a posture that lent itself to a hand fighting style. A posture that spoke to military training. Especially training that one would have gotten as a part of the elite squads tasked with hunting the Gifted.

  “Relax. I'm not going to hurt her; besides, I'm not the one that is Gifted. He is.” Urake motioned towards Emeck who paled slightly. The door rattled as if someone had fallen against it. Urake saw Redzyn’s shocked face illuminated through the barred window and framed by his white knuckles wrapped around the bars. He knew that the news about Em’risi’s Gift would come out eventually so Emeck wouldn’t be in any imminent danger. Turning back to Torroth, he saw that the young man was as shocked as Redzyn.

  “This isn’t right… The army would have him killed right away. This has to be something different… Who are you people?” Torroth puzzled over the conflicting information he had been presented with.

  “Best ask Colonel Redzyn that.” Urake stepped past Torroth and reached for the girl’s wrist to check for a pulse. At his touch she gasped for air and her eyes flew open and glowed briefly with a light blue light. Light of a darker shade spilled out onto the bed. Urake didn’t have to lift his cloak to know that Ice Heart was glowing again.

  Chapter Two: Escape

  “I can’t believe that he looks like he is just sleeping after all that he has been through.” Roild stood on the other side of the bars observing the human. He was not overly joyful with how his life had been turned upside down for this human.

  “There hasn’t been a mark on him since yesterday. Never seen anyone heal so fast. Only a little more than a week ago, he was a mass of bruises.” Taric returned to polishing his armor. The normally touchy dwarf was remarkably calm considering they had been confined to this tunnel gate fort for the last several days.

  “I wish my feet could heal as fast.”

  “What are you complaining about? You are almost walking normally again.” Taric shook his head at Roild’s muttered complaint.

  “You are one to talk. I followed you every step of the way and you don’t have a single blister to remember it by. Nearly killed him keeping you alive and on top of that, he had to go and save you from blisters. Fool human.” R
oild turned moodily away from the bars and dropped into a chair. His feet were mostly healed although they were still tender and no amount of padding in his boots could overcame the pain that began if he stood too long.

  “I still don’t believe you.” Taric polished a little harder at an invisible speck on his shoulder plate. Roild pursed his lips a moment thinking that perhaps the boredom was finally getting to his friend.

  “Oh whatever, that light walker is able to make you do impossible stuff. I have seen it.” Shaking his head, Roild was glad to change the topic from his feet. Taric had no memory from the times that the light walker had taken him over and would argue vehemently as to the impossibility of a cloud of light taking control of his body without his knowledge. Roild refrained from describing the feats that he hardly believed even after watching them. One doesn’t speak of having walked through submerged tunnels or seeing a dwarf casually toss boulders aside without people looking sideways at him. Taric was about to make a denunciation of Roild’s comment when Seeroth rapped on the door. The guard that was lounging inside the door jumped to his feet and undid the latch and allowed the captain of the guard inside.

  “I don’t like the feel of it out there. Someone was following me. Took me wandering the better half of the city before I lost him.” Seeroth was the grizzled of veteran of hundreds of cave expeditions and had been in more battles than the younger dwarves he was addressing had lived years of life. The human that they suspected of being a new Dragon Lord had been attacked by a fraction of dwarven rebels responsible for the curse that destroyed the old Dragon Lords. Seeroth had them hiding in one of the old tunnel guard posts that were scattered around Underheim at each of the tunnel gates.

  “I want all the guards to move inside here. We can keep watch from the overlooks.” Seeroth sent out the guard that had opened the door to retrieve the guards stationed around the guard post. It was a relic from the Millennium Wars and had held off a couple invasion attempts during its time. Built out of the natural stone, it presided over a choke point where the cave walls had narrowed before opening up to the cavern that housed Underheim. A thick stone slab still hung over the gate. It had been plastered into place long ago since there hadn’t been any armies threatening. During the Millennium war, it had hung ready to drop into place and seal the tunnel. At that point, anyone still left outside the gate had little defense from the slotted windows carved into the stone. On the inside, they were wider windows where a dwarf could rain death down on those outside while remaining safe from any but the best rangers. The city side still offered a fair amount of defense should the holdfast be attacked from the other side. Guards were posted at these windows and the door was again bared in place.